Approximately one in ten people on the planet don't have access to clean water. Infrastructure issues affecting clean water have crept into the United States in Flint, Michigan, and concerns about water sources have become white-hot debate points surrounding oil pipelines. Fortunately, an engineer in Chile named Hector Pino has developed a system that could provide significant relief—a device that produces water by absorbing the humidity in the ambient air.
The FreshWater machine can work with AC power, its own battery, or solar energy. It pulls water vapor out of the air to form artificial clouds, which "rain" down clean water to be collected, mimicking the natural water cycle. In San Pedro de Atacama, an arid mountain town in northwestern Chile, a FreshWater device produced almost two and a half gallons of water in a day. It's a limited amount, but if the technology can be improved and scaled, it could provide relief to remote communities.
The water fountain-like device cost around $1,600. Pino is working on making a smaller version, more like a backpack to be toted around. If FreshWater can be made portable, affordable, and continue working like Pino's demonstrations, it could become a crucial part of clean water production worldwide.
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